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David Kirby (poet)
David K. Kirby (born 1944) is an American poet. academic, and literary critic. Life Kirby earned a Ph.D. in 1969 from Johns Hopkins University. He lives with his wife, poet Barbara Hamby, in Tallahassee, Florida, where he is the Robert O. Lawton Distinguished Professor of English at Florida State University (FSU). Kirby has taught at FSU's international campuses in Florence, Paris, Valencia, and elsewhere. Kirby has published over 20 books, including collections of poetry, and literary criticism. His poems frequently appear in The Southern Review. His collected earlier poems, up to the transitional Big-Leg Music, have been published as I Think I Am Going to Call My Wife Paraguay. Writing Kirby's earliest books of verse, Sarah Bernhardt's Leg (1983) and Saving the Young Men of Vienna (1987, winner of the Brittingham Prize), showed the distinctive mixture of lyricism and wit that can be found in his later work, which began in Big-Leg Music (1995). In that collection, Kirby began presenting what he termed "memory poems," freewheeling, associative verse with long lines in shaped stanzas that give play to his interests in high and popular culture, are informed by personal and cultural experiences in the author's life, and present, under the guise of apparent ingenuousness, an array of literary and cultural theories wittily and succinctly stated—all making what the poet and critic Peter Klappert has termed "the Kirby poem." Kirby's later titles in this vein include My Twentieth Century, The House of Blue Light, and The Travelling Library. Recognition His volume, The Ha-Ha was chosen 1 of 10 "Best Books of 2003" by Boston Globe critic Clea Simon,Mike Arnold, New Hampshire Public Radio, 17 December 2003 and was shortlisted for the Griffin Poetry Prize. His work has won numerous awards, including 4 Pushcart Prizes, the James Dickey Prize, and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Guggenheim Foundation. His new and selected poetry collection, The House on Boulevard St. (Louisiana State University Press), was nominated for the 2007 National Book Award in poetry. Awards * Grants from Florida Arts Council - 1983, 1989,1996, 2002 * Grant from The National Endowment for the Arts - 1985 * Brittingham Prize in Poetry - 1987 * University Teaching Awards - 1992, 1997 * The Best American Poetry 2000 * The Best American Poetry 2001 * Pushcart Prize XXV - 2001 * Guggenheim Fellowship - 2003 * Robert O. Lawton Distinguished Professorship - 2003 * Finalist, Griffin Poetry Prize (International), 2004 * The Best American Poetry 2006 * The Best American Poetry 2007 * National Book Award Nominee 2007 Publications Poetry *''Sarah Bernhardt's Leg: Poems''. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland State University Poetry Center, 1983. *''Diving for Poems''. Tallahassee, FL: Word Beat Press, 1985. * Saving the Young Men of Vienna. Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1987. * Big Leg Music. Alexandria, VA: Orchises Press, 1995. * My Twentieth Century. Alexandria, VA: Orchises Press, 1999. * The House of Blue Light: Poems. Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State University Press, 2000. * The Travelling Library: Three poems. Washington, DC: Orchises Press, 2001. * The Ha-Ha: Poems. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2003. * I Think I Am Going to Call My Wife Paraguay: Selected early poems. Alexandria, VA: Orchises Press, 2004. * The House on Boulevard St.: New and selected poems. Baton Rouge. LA: Louisiana State University Press, 2007. * The Temple Gate Called Beautiful. Farmington, ME: Alice James Books, 2008. * Talking about Movies with Jesus: Poems. Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State University Press, 2011. *''The Biscuit Joint: Poems''. Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State University Press, 2013. Non-fiction * Writing Poetry: Where poems come from and how to write them. Boston: The Writer, 1989. * Mark Strand, and the Poet's Place in Contemporary Culture. Columbia, MO: University of Missouri Press, 1990. * Herman Melville. New York: Continuum, 1993. * What is a Book? Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 2002. * Ultra-Talk: Johnny Cash, The mafia, Shakespeare, drum music, St. Teresa of Avila, and 17 other colossal topics of conversation. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 2007. * Little Richard: The birth of rock 'n' roll ''. New York: Continuum, 2009. Juvenile *''The Cows Are Going to Paris (with Allen Woodman; illustrated by Chris L. Demarest). Honesdale, PA: Caroline House, 1991. *''The Bear Who Came to Stay'' (with Allen Woodman; illustrated by Harvey Stevenson). New York: Bradbury Press / New York & Toronto: Maxwell Macmillan, 1994. Edited *''Seriously Funny: Poems about love, death, religion, art, politics, sex, and everything else'' (edited with Barbara Hamby). Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 2010. Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy WorldCat.Search results = au:David Kirby, WorldCat, OCLC Online Computer Library Center Inc. Web, Oct. 24, 2014. See also *List of U.S. poets *List of literary critics References External links ;Poems *"Monte (Peace in Our Time)" * David Kirby b. 1944 at the Poetry Foundation ; Audio / video * Griffin Poetry Prize reading, including video clip *David Kirby at YouTube ; About * Florida State University, Department of English website *[http://www.rinr.fsu.edu/winter2004/coverstory.html MacQueen, Steve. "Sho' Like to Ball: David Kirby Hits 'Em High and Low In a Galloping Career Through the Quirky World of Free Verse." Research in Review, 14 (Winter 2004)] (Retrieved September 6, 2006) *page at Florida State University profile * Griffin Poetry Prize biography * David Kirby, Poet and Professor Official website. Category:American poets Category:Living people Category:Florida State University faculty Category:1944 births Category:American academics Category:Writers from Florida Category:People from Florida Category:Johns Hopkins University alumni Category:Guggenheim Fellows Category:National Endowment for the Arts Fellows Category:20th-century poets Category:21st-century poets Category:English-language poets Category:Poets